[72]
Dahlia crossed her legs and spoke with an indifferent expression.
Her attitude seemed so cold that it was hard to believe she was the same person who had cared for Dain, saying she reminded her of her younger sister.
“You mean the guiding… establishment?”
“Yes.”
Discomfort surged within Chris.
Though he knew it wasn’t time to condemn Dahlia if he wanted to get the information he needed, he couldn’t help but recall Yuri who had been kidnapped in the past.
Yuri probably hadn’t realized it in his disoriented state, but the cage where the human traffickers had placed him at the auction house had dried bloodstains on it.
Chris, who had been desperate to look after his Guide, hadn’t thought deeply about what those stains meant.
But when Yuri, whom he had barely rescued, began suffering from drug withdrawal symptoms, Chris pondered the cause of those bloodstains for the first time.
Perhaps a Guide had been injured while resisting being sold. Or maybe they had bled while suffering from withdrawal symptoms. Or they might have self-harmed while hallucinating.
That was the first moment Chris had looked into someone else’s suffering beyond Yuri’s.
“It’s not run with a system like Northernlight, so sometimes you get lucky and the guiding works well, sometimes you’re unlucky and there’s hardly any effect.”
“So you can’t confirm the matching rate.”
Dahlia glanced at Chris with a look that seemed to say, “Well, look at this young master.”
Come to think of it, he was Yuri Sobolev’s Esper. He probably never had trouble with guiding issues.
“You think matching rate is the only problem?”
Dahlia asked meaningfully, as if she wanted to give him a taste of an unregistered Esper’s life.
“Then…?”
“Well, I wouldn’t think there are only real Guides in a place like that anyway.”
Dahlia muttered.
“Where is it located?”
She glanced at Chris.
“Why? Planning to turn the kids there over to Northernlight like Dain?”
Her question was tinged with both resignation and curiosity.
“…I think they should at least be given a choice between their current life and a new one.”
Dahlia snickered.
“Then they’d obviously choose to keep living as they have been. How stupid.”
It wasn’t a malicious sneer. Rather, it seemed like she was trying to give him a hint.
Chris hesitated briefly before answering.
“I’ll take a good look, considering that point as well.”
“Untie me.”
Dahlia extended her arms toward him. Chris readily released the restraints that had been binding her powers.
Dahlia looked at Chris in surprise.
“You’re… just going to do that without saying I shouldn’t?”
“Didn’t you ask to be released?”
“No. I mean, aren’t you worried that if you free an Esper like me, I might try to escape?”
“Ah.”
Chris made a slightly awkward face.
Right now, it was just the two of them here. There were no hostages, and Chris’s power wasn’t the visible kind.
Dahlia wouldn’t realize it, but if she showed any suspicious behavior, Chris was confident he could subdue her without difficulty.
Probably Chase, another S-class Esper he knew, would have made a similar choice. And if asked such a question, he would have said, “Go ahead and try,” with a smirk on his face.
But Chris wasn’t quite that disagreeable in character.
“…I wouldn’t recommend attempting to escape.”
“Well, that’s not why I asked you to untie me anyway.”
Dahlia sighed, rotated her sore wrists, and then pointed at the ground.
Moss growing on the bare earth was forming a map.
“That’s fascinating.”
“With Mihir dead, it’s a talent perfect for running a flower shop.”
Dahlia sneered.
“I think it’s a wonderful ability.”
Chris said plainly, then held out the restraints to her again.
Dahlia smiled mischievously but obediently extended her hands to put the restraints back on.
“I’ll be going now.”
“Wait.”
When Dahlia stopped him, Chris turned around with a puzzled look.
“…I saw Dain.”
She added that a man named Luka had brought her, then after hesitating for a long time, she blurted out:
“Thank you.”
She seemed to have tried to smile, but her lips twisted strangely.
Chris thought she was truly a dishonest person.
It was strange that she didn’t even ask what would happen to her fate from now on.
She was the most unusual person Chris had met recently.
Dahlia maintained that almost-smile for quite a while.
At least until Chris ripped out the entire section of floor where the moss had drawn the map.
***
Chris placed the moss-covered map in front of Yuri.
The thud was quite heavy.
“Couldn’t you have just taken a photo with your device?”
Yuri muttered while rubbing his eyes.
“I thought I should bring it before anyone else saw it.”
“…Good job.”
It was evident that he had tried to restrain himself from his usual criticism and deliberately softened his voice.
When Chris moved his head slightly, Yuri’s eyebrows stiffened sharply as he noticed something.
“On your head.”
After identifying what it was, Yuri sighed and reached out his hand.
“You should notice when a flower blooms on you.”
In his hand, which had returned to its original position, was a small yellow flower that looked like a sunflower.
“Ah. I think Dahlia did it.”
Chris examined the small sunflower curiously as Yuri handed it to him.
It seemed she had energy left even while drawing the map with moss.
“I didn’t notice because I didn’t sense any killing intent.”
“What if she had made a flower bloom in something as vulnerable as your eye?”
“I would have sensed it before that happened.”
Espers could sensitively detect when someone was trying to use power against them.
Especially, it wasn’t easy for a lower-ranked Esper to secretly attack a higher-ranked one.
Above all, from what Chris could tell, Dahlia seemed unable to make anything grow in places where plants had never grown before. At minimum, there would need to be dried-up roots or seeds remaining.
Anong, who had a similar type of ability, wore bracelets and necklaces made by weaving pretty seeds among ornate accessories.
“What if it had already happened?”
“I would pull out the flower and regenerate my eye.”
Having answered honestly without thinking, Chris immediately regretted it.
Yuri’s face hardened terribly.
“You’re so good at giving straightforward answers.”
He would probably never understand the arrogance of Espers in his lifetime.
Even Chris spoke so casually about such things; how much worse must others be?
“If it bothers you… I’ll be more careful.”
At those words, Yuri looked at him like a beast trying to imitate a human.
Yuri roughly tousled his hair and carelessly tossed away the flower.
There seemed no need to mention what would have happened if it had been a dangerous species like monkshood.
“So. The Guides are trapped here?”
“They don’t seem to be completely restricted. She implied that if given a choice, some people would choose to stay there.”
“In other words…”
Yuri examined the map with a cold expression and muttered.
“There’s a factor keeping them there.”
Whether drugs or threats.
“If Thorns Order is receiving guiding through establishments operating like this… we need to cut it off.”
Espers tend to hold back when they lack guiding. There weren’t many who wanted to go crazy, rampage, and destroy everything.
What villain doesn’t value their own life, even if they’d kill others?
“I’ll look into it.”
Yuri nodded slightly at Chris’s words.
“I trust your abilities, but…”
To be honest, Chris wasn’t particularly good at verbal skills or handling unexpected situations.
He had a strong tendency to try to solve everything with force.
‘It’s quite admirable that he doesn’t come back injured.’
Yuri omitted such thoughts and said:
“Guides trapped in places like this probably have civilian-level durability at best. If you’re discovered, they might get hurt or be moved elsewhere.”
“I’ll be careful.”
Determination flickered across Chris’s face.
“Assess the situation, but prioritize rescue.”
Yuri reached out and gently pressed down on Chris’s tensed shoulders. Feeling his body instantly relax, Yuri said:
“But if you sacrifice yourself trying to save innocent people, I won’t let it slide.”
“…Yes.”
Even Yuri knew he was acting like a demanding boss.
But Chris would accomplish it. If you input the right values, he would output the desired results.
Having incredibly inhuman abilities while being hopelessly clumsy as a human was both his strength and weakness.
“Alright then.”
***
“Tell them I won’t die alone!”
Martha Chafnil, the mayor of Babel City, slammed down the receiver with a harsh exclamation.
The elegant room was in complete disarray, as if a typhoon had swept through.
Breathing heavily, Martha unbuttoned a few buttons and sat down in a torn armchair.
The phone began to ring again. She picked up the poker she had placed on the desk and struck the antique.
Crash!
She remembered how much she had paid for it at auction. Visitors would often admire that phone, which she had gone to great lengths to make compatible with modern devices.
However, such petty vanity wasn’t enough to soothe the current Martha.
Knock knock.
There was a knocking sound at the door.
“Mayor, someone from ‘Thorn’ is here.”
A tense voice was heard.
‘I told them to use the name.’
No, if a mere investigator had used the name, she might have been even more irritated. The image she had been cultivating was already in shambles.
Martha casually surveyed her chaotic office and declared:
“Come in.”
The door opened, and Abigail with a pale face appeared.
And behind her stood a massive man.
“Oh my.”
As if the door was too small, the man bent down, touching the ceiling with his hand, and poked his head in first.
“This is why I hate coming outside. Everything’s as tiny as toys.”
“You may leave, Abigail.”
At Martha’s gesture, the investigator bowed her head and closed the door.
The man strode in and sat down on a chair that still looked somewhat intact.
Crossing his legs in a way that was more threatening than elegant, he joked:
“If I don’t pay attention, I bump into things and get bruises.”
Martha might have laughed if she hadn’t been in her current mood.
Instead, she pointed the poker she was holding at the tip of the man’s chin.
“What exactly is Thorns Order doing?”
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
